At today's session, the government should verify the conclusion by which it obliged the Revenue and Customs Administration (UPC) to submit to it within five days a proposal for a decision on the request of the "Jack Pot" company for the extension of the concession for organizing games of chance in the hotel casino "Falkensteiner" in Bečići, after which this state administration should fulfill its obligation.
"The Government decree stipulates that the conclusions from the previous session will be verified at the next session, which means that the conclusions from the previous session will be verified tomorrow. After that, they are signed and submitted to the competent authorities for action", the Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare told "News" yesterday in response to the question of whether the acting director of UPC Milena Petričević acted according to the Government's conclusion.
The Ministry said that if Petričević does not act on the conclusion, further steps will be defined in cooperation with the Protector of Property and Legal Interests of Montenegro.
Solution
At its session last week, the government obliged the UPC to submit to it within five days a proposal for a decision on the request of the company "Jack Pot" for the extension of the concession for organizing games of chance in the casino of the hotel "Falkensteiner" in Bečići.
According to unofficial information from "Vijesti" from the Government, Petričević, meanwhile, on Tuesday passed a decision on the formation of a working team "to solve cases in the field of games of chance that are current for a long period of time".
The team consists of Snežana Vukajlović (president) and four members - Željka Dragaš, Ilda Suruliz, Dragoljub Nikolić and Halima Ademović. Dragaš and Suruliz are from the Gaming Sector.
"Jack Pot" requested the exemption of Ćetković from decision-making on the concession request, which Petričević accepted
The task of the working team, as the source of "Vijesti" said, is to conduct administrative proceedings in cases from the field of games of chance that are current in the work of the Sector for games of chance for a long period of time. The decision does not state how many of these items there are and their names, but it is pointed out that priority is given to the request of the "Jackpot" company, which on October 1 last year submitted a request for the granting of concession rights to organize games of chance in the hotel "Falkensteiner" casino in Becici.
The owners of the company "Jack pot" are Branislav Mićunović and Sava Grbović.
"Priority in the order of dealing with those cases should be in relation to the conclusions of the report on the control of the Internal Control Department of the UPC dated March 28, 3, where it was stated that it is necessary to decide on the request of the company "Jack pot" as a priority. In the decision, it is stated that the work team will start work on the day of the adoption of the decision, that is, on the fifth of April, and that the authorized official of the Dragaš Gaming Sector has the obligation to act in accordance with the Law on Administrative Procedure within 2022 days from the date of adoption of the decision at the latest to the request of "Jackpot" from October 15 last year and end the administrative procedure and make an appropriate decision", says the source of "Vijesti", adding that "the work team is obliged to deliver to Petričević a report on the work after solving each individual case".
Professional cooperation
Petričević, as the "Vijesti" source explains, stated in the new decision that the working team for solving cases in the field of games of chance that are current for a long period of time, which was formed on November 23 last year, is being dissolved.
That team was chaired by the Acting Assistant of the Sector for Games of Chance Andrija Ćetković.
The "Vijesti" source states that Petričević stated in her decision that for the resolution of a certain number of cases in the field of games of chance, "the professional cooperation of civil servants from various internal organizational units is necessary in terms of conducting the administrative procedure for the adoption of administrative acts with the time priority of acting on the request that "Jackpot" submitted".
On the same day when the government made the decision that Patričević should submit a proposal for a decision on the request of the "Jack pot" company, Petričević informed the public that her internal control had "found out the factual situation" in that case and that she had adopted four measures on that occasion.
The measures are the initiation of disciplinary proceedings against five employees of the Sector for Games of Chance, so that the work team formed in the Administration, in November 2021, acts in accordance with the obligation to submit a report on Petričević's work. The third measure is for the authorized acting official of the Gaming Sector to act on the request of the concessionaire and end the administrative procedure and issue an appropriate decision in accordance with the Law on Administrative Procedure. The fourth measure is for the Sector for Games of Chance to implement the competition procedure in accordance with Article 11, paragraph 1 and 2, of the Law on Games of Chance.
Ćetković previously suggested that the concessionaire company "Jackpot" should not be approached for the extension of the concession because it has already used that right once, and this is also the position of the Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare headed by Milojko Spajić.
After her appearance in public, Ćetković sent a letter to Petričević in which he warns her that in the case of the "Jack Pot" affair, his actions violate the law, undermine the credibility of that institution and potentially cause multimillion-dollar damage to the state. He also sent the letter to several addresses in the Ministry of Finance, including Minister Milojko Spajić.
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